Improvement in water-wheels



ALFRED KNEASS, OF NORTHUMBERLAND, PENNSYLVANIA.

IM PROVEM ENT IN WATER-WHEELS.

Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 105,698, dated July V26, 1870.

To all whom it may concern:

Be itvknown that I, ALFRED KNEAss, of

' Northumberland, in the county of N orthumberland and State of-` Pennsylvania, have invented a new Vand Improved Water-Wheel; and I do hereby declare that the following is a full, clear, and exact description thereof, which will enable. others skilled in the art to make and use the same, reference being had to the accompanying drawing, forming part of this specification.

This invention relates to improvements in that class of water-wheels in which the appli'- cation of the-water is designed to bev such as to impart both direct and reactionary force; and it consists in a peculiar arrangement of curved buckets, receiving the water at the periphery from a scroll in a direct-acting way, and discharging toward the center through issues common to two or morebuckets, and above and below a central disk by which the buckets and rims are attached to the vertical shaft, all as hereinafter more fully described.

Figure 1 is a horizontal section of my improved wheel, and Fig. 2 isI a transverse section of the same. y Similar letters of reference indicate corresponding parts. y

A is the scroll; B, onerim of the wheel, and G the other. D is the central disk, to which the rims converge, and by which the whole is attached to the shaftE. F and F represent the buckets, arranged between the rims B C, beginning at the periphery, where they are widest, nearly in radiallines, but assuming the double curved lines shown in the drawing,

terminating tangentially at the inner edges of the rims, except every third bucket, F', which continues around the inner edges of the rim the distance of three spaces, forming issues Gr for three buckets. These issues are narrowed down by the inclined arrangement ot' the rims B C, and they are divided horizontally by the disk D, so that one-halfthe water is discharged above and the other below the said disk.

It will be seen that by this arrangement the lirst application of the water on the buckets at the periphery has the effect to impel them around by direct action the way the water runs, and that in passing through the issues G, the motion being reversed and the area of the issues contracted, a powerful reacting force is imparted to the wheel in the same direction that the direct action impels it. These issues may be provided with adjustable slides on the exterior walls of the rims B C for varying their capacity of discharge as required, according to the amount of power required.

Y Having thus described my invention, I claim as new and desire to secure by Letters Patent- 1. The arrangement 'of the converging rims B C, disk D, and buckets F F', all substantially as specified.

2. The arrangement of the buckets F with the buckets F and the rims B C, forming the issues Gr, common to two or more buckets, substantially as specified.

ALF. KNEASS.

Witnesses:

A'. J. MILLER, ABEL GIBBoNs. 

